Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

Title: Dead Until Dark

Author: Charlaine Harris

# pages: 292

Date published: 2001

Genre: paranormal romance

Series: Southern Vampire/Sookie Stackhouse series book #1

Challenge(s): Unread authors

Rating:

(good)

Setting: Louisiana

First Sentence:

“I’d been waiting for the vampire for years when he walked into the bar.”

What Is It About? Sookie Stackhouse, a cocktail waitress in Bon Temps, Louisiana, has a disability—she can read people’s minds. Cool, you think? Well, maybe not so much. Believe it or not, reading minds is not great fun. In fact, it’s completely ruined Sookie’s love life (imagine being able to tell exactly what a guy is thinking during sex—uh—no thanks, I don’t think so—talk about a mood killer). Enter Bill, a vampire. His mind is impenetrable to Sookie—how refreshing for her! In Sookie’s world, vampires are just starting to be accepted into mainstream America. They are considered to be the victims of a virus that has turned them into what they are. Bon Temps, however, is a little behind the times. When young women from the town start to die—with fang marks on their thighs—all eyes turn toward Sookie’s new beau.

Random Thoughts: I enjoyed Dead Until Dark, but it didn’t wow me. Those of you who have been reading my blog for a while might remember that vampire stories don’t do much for me (Twilight? Eh, not so much—not my thing). The only exception I’ve found to this rule so far is the Queen Betsy series by Mary Janice Davidson (Undead and Unwed). These I find hysterical and have the second book in the series waiting to be read. But while I enjoyed Dead Until Dark, I’m don’t think I’m going to seek out the rest of this series at this time (it’s not like I don’t have anything else to read ;o)).

Fun tidbits:

• Charlaine Harris’s Website
• Awards: Won the Anthony Award for Best Paperback Mystery in 2002
• Harris has some other series, minus the vampires, that I would like to check out:
• The Aurora "Roe" Teagarden series—a series of cozy mysteries starring a small-town librarian.
• The Harper Connelly series—Harper finds dead people.
• The Lily Bard “Shakespeare” series—another set of cozies.

Let’s give people a variety of opinions! If you've reviewed this book (or a book by this author), leave me a link to your review in the comments and I'll link to your review, too!

Also reviewed by:

DeSeRt RoSe